Raiding is on the verge of destroying huge segments of the GW2 community, if it hasn't already

Comments

I write this as a semi-casual, semi-serious player. I've played GW2 off-and-on since launch. I've also raided regularly, in other games, at "competent" levels, but never at top-tier / world-first / competitive levels....In those times, I loved raiding....I loved figuring out that last 1% of mechanics, or positioning. or build....that let us finally beat that "impossible" boss.....and I never gave 2 kitten about the gear! Gear was only a means to an end....to allow us to kill that boss, and have more fun.

But in GW2....I see such a huge rift between raiders and not-raiders.....a rift that grows with every update, every raid...

Even in my own guilds, when recruiting for their raid team(s)....they are only interested in "experienced" raiders. I understand their view...they did their time in PUG raids back in 2016 and 2017, learning mechanics and classes and how to build a raid team. They don't want to waste infinitely - 1 sec training others! But at the same time, when I look in LFG, every raid wants me to ping a trophy count...to prove to them that I have tons of kill experience, in every raid.. Or they want to sell me boss kills.....something I'd never, ever, consider paying for!

So what is a 'semi-casual', "competent-but-not-uber DPS", though "wants-to-learn" supposed to do?

You are in the wrong guild, find a new one that offers training and build help, but ya I agree about raids being toxic.

Introducing raids was, in my opinion, the worst thing they could do. They should have used the resources for fractals and wvw. Those were the two things that made Guild Wars 2 a big thing in the beginning. Living story is nice to have, but the majority didn't need raids which make even more balancing necessary which means more work for the GW2 team.
People that really like raids play other mmorpg, GW2 had the "unique selling point" of wvw in the mmorpg market and small group pve content with scaling difficulty. Both of those were neglected for a long time when raids were introduced and so many resources wasted into legendary armor for raids and other stuff.

Organized group pve content is destroying the game. But that's true for all MMOs. I decided against joining any organized pve group in this game and I'm very happy with the game. In WoW I was a mythic raider and this essentially sucked all fun out of the game. The few pve groups I joined in GW2 made me really reconsider if I wanted to do raids/fractals or not.

ANet as a gaming studio has always had a tendency to want to please the dedicated, hardcore players. This goes back to their original game, and is still true today. GW2 was always supposed to have harder PvE content for those players. The truth is, though, that ANet struggled for a long time to offer the kind of challenge needed to please the ultra-dedicated players. Some seem to say that even raids did not go far enough.

In GW2, ANet chose to make large areas of the game accessible and (hopefully) fun for less dedicated players. This is largely due to the fact that gaming businesses make money by appealing to as broad a range of possible customers as possible. Hardcore MMO players are spread across multiple games, so there aren't enough to ensure enough revenue to make today's resource-intensive games, especially over a long time. As a result of that decision to go for broader appeal, there is a range of PvE content difficulty. That is necessary in today's market. It means, though, that it is unlikely that all content is going to be for all players -- as much as ANet might prefer otherwise..

it seems some players do not accept that there will be parts of the game that are not aimed at them. This seems to be more true of the less-dedicated than the more. The more-dedicated seem - by and large - to know and accept that there are going to be large areas of the game that are not going to offer the difficulty they prefer.

The truth -- at least as far as I can see based on observation -- is that those complaining about raids are not a huge majority of the less-dedicated players. I see that as a good thing. As a result of that observation, I have a hard time believing that raids are on the verge of doing anything other than: appealing to their targeted audience; and frustrating some subset of PvE players who are not part of the targeted audience, but who want to raid. In an ideal world, with infinite resources to build games, ANet might be able to make versions of all content for all demographics. We don't live in that world. For every attempt to address those who feel left out of raids, either raid content delivery would get slowed down, or something else would.

As it is, there are training raids. There are also easier raid encounters on which a new group can get experience. If that is not enough for those who want in but demand that any group ought to take them, then that is too bad.

Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it. -- Santayana

Well the entire problem lies in the game mechanics. Basicly u can go everywhere just join in and get ur rewards. Their is one expection Raids.

U need to invest time and research. As a semi causual player. Before u go in u have to look first what raids are easy, so u can join in and get some Li. After u are familiar with the game mode u can try the harder Raids. U need proper equiment unlike in the other game modes. ANd u need to know about gamemechanics.

The Raid community of gw2 is very friendly. If u dont try to join the hardest Raids like Dhuum. Ppl will just carry u.

First when i tryed Raids. I was looking for VG groups cause it is the first boss. Very bad idea. Just try ur luck in Escort raids, so u get a feeling that about the mechanics. It is one of the easiest Raids. Still if u go in into Escort like u would go into any other game mode it is for sure a failure.

And again. Raids are easy to access but u have to inest time and research before u can move in. It is unlike the other game modes of gw2.

Next is ur charcter u choose. Their are Key positions in Raids u cant access as a beginner. Thouse ppl have to know their role. Else it is a fail.
If u choose a non key position u can get carried easyl with 8 or 9 man who know what they do.

Next is u have to be honest. I was carried by alot of raiders. Even when i told them i had 0-10 Li. As long as the other raiders know u a re a noob, they can adjust themself to ur failures. If u lie to them and they trust about ur knowledge and u will do the mistakes it will end in a yell.

So if u want to raid and want to invest the time and effort and research it is an easy task to climb the Li letter.

I even endet up in commanding my own raid teams for some time. And from time to time im teaching my guild members about the basics of Raids.

The only thing u could compare Raids are Fractal CM modes. (Honestly i find cm fractals harder. They dont accept as much failures as in Raids.)

@Blocki.4931 said:
The answer is: No. There is no problem, but a whole lot of people not willing to put in the required work + people being fed up with that attitude.

See: The dozen other threads on this topic.

They leave training to the training guilds and prefer to simply do quick and easy clears without having to worry about carrying other people. This rift you're seeing is nothing more than people who despise raids being very loud and people who despise casuals being very loud, endless yelling at each other.

I disagree, there is a rift growing and as raiders drop off in raiding guilds because of time, lack of interest other games they wont be replaced with anyone.

You're very anti-raid, that you're seeing a rift there doesn't surprise me. Interest is dropping because content doesn't release at a fast enough pace for them to care. Then they come back once the new raid is out, do it for a couple months and stop playing it again. Does that surprise anybody? It shouldn't.

Smugly chuckling forever.
My sentence doesn't make sense? Well, I probably forgot to write half of it before posting.

Players that aren't "good" enough for a difficulty wanting to run it anyway. Some of these people actually understand that they're not good enough, but they want to see it, and experience it. There are groups that will do that, my guild in DDO for one, where we had a handful of people that could solo the content, and so, running them through wasn't going to be a real detriment. There are also groups that won't. There are those that will run people down for even wanting to look in their "elite" content. Hell, I've seen a post here complaining about everyone having mounts. These people are very real, and they may even be in your guilds.

Players that will run an ad for a group, requiring gear for a top tier run, in a story mode run. Flashback to DDO, where a cleric cried for about 15 minutes because my character didn't have enough HP to run a quest on Elite. After listening to the whining for 15 minutes, I dropped group, and then did a solo run of the same quest, on Elite, and finished before they did. Then there was the DPS Sage in swtor that was crying about the gear the healers were wearing for the 20 or so minutes they were in the group before we filled. The boss had a big tell, sirens blaring, lights flashing, and then a laser that would 1 shot you. The DPS died in that every time. I guess having all the right gear didn't give them all the right skills, and the guy that prompted the first line of this paragraph, also in swtor, requiring Nightmare gear for a story mode run.

Then there are the "show me you have the achievement for this raid before we'll let you in the group. Gee, if I had the achievement, I wouldn't need to be in your group. My healer spec'd sage in swtor was denied entrance into one such raid, for that very reason. My guildies and I were chatting about it, and I decided to see just how hard it would be to solo it, and I did solo it, with one of her NPC crewmates, anyway. These kinds of people are far more common than what reading in these topics would suggest, but at the end of the day, they're not just here. They're playing any MMO with group content, and they'll raise hell if things aren't done exactly the way they think it should be done. In guild groups, I have replaced some of these players with hirelings/crew, and didn't even miss them being there, and in one instance, the raid was easier w/out him.

For all that, though, they're not the end of an MMO. They like to believe that they're crème de la crème, but sometimes, they're just sour milk. I've been in groups with some that asked me why I don't join a larger raid focused guild, and I told them the same thing I'll say here: I tend to get pretty good at games I play. I have lots of time to practice. But, I don't play for prestige, I play for fun. I'd rather wipe 3 or 4 times on a Nightmare/Elite run, and have stories to laugh about later, such as one of my guild leaders that loves to zerg, but just doesn't understand how, than stress out about who missed what in which rotation. The best solution is to find some like minded people and make your own guild. Find an entry level raid, and run it. Understand that in learning it, you're likely going to die, sometimes a lot, but learn from it, and have some fun. Laugh at the mistakes, especially your own, but learn from them. Eventually, even if you're just a raid group sized guild, you'll find that you're running them ok, and that those people that have snubbed you don't matter in the least bit. Get out there, find the people that want to learn it, and go.

@ArchonWing.9480 said:
If they didn't have raids, you'd have elitists in dungeons or fractals or whatnot. The good thing about raids is they're confined there now.

I seriously dont think theyre confined anywhere. Its really just the content that both needs large amount of repitition for some of the interesting rewards and require some rather mild coordination.

Since most people dont have that much time putting requirements is just one way to filter ppl so their success chance is higher and take less time. They dont want to bother explaining the whole thing everytime and rather just play.

This is partially correct.

There is however the other side that most people don't get. Training people is mentally taxing. Sure sometimes you get the people who research, care and geniunely want to improve. However those are far from the norm. From my time training people and not in one of the bigger Raid training groups is a lot of push back, crying and people adamant that they know better and outright refusing any help, critique or otherwise.

@ArchonWing.9480 said:
If they didn't have raids, you'd have elitists in dungeons or fractals or whatnot. The good thing about raids is they're confined there now.

I seriously dont think theyre confined anywhere. Its really just the content that both needs large amount of repitition for some of the interesting rewards and require some rather mild coordination.

Since most people dont have that much time putting requirements is just one way to filter ppl so their success chance is higher and take less time. They dont want to bother explaining the whole thing everytime and rather just play.

This is partially correct.

There is however the other side that most people don't get. Training people is mentally taxing. Sure sometimes you get the people who research, care and geniunely want to improve. However those are far from the norm. From my time training people and not in one of the bigger Raid training groups is a lot of push back, crying and people adamant that they know better and outright refusing any help, critique or otherwise.

The people you describe in the last sentence are the real toxic players.

@ArchonWing.9480 said:
If they didn't have raids, you'd have elitists in dungeons or fractals or whatnot. The good thing about raids is they're confined there now.

I seriously dont think theyre confined anywhere. Its really just the content that both needs large amount of repitition for some of the interesting rewards and require some rather mild coordination.

Since most people dont have that much time putting requirements is just one way to filter ppl so their success chance is higher and take less time. They dont want to bother explaining the whole thing everytime and rather just play.

This is partially correct.

There is however the other side that most people don't get. Training people is mentally taxing. Sure sometimes you get the people who research, care and geniunely want to improve. However those are far from the norm. From my time training people and not in one of the bigger Raid training groups is a lot of push back, crying and people adamant that they know better and outright refusing any help, critique or otherwise.

I had a unique experience where a group I was attempting to train on vg said that having green circles and blue circles was too confusing and they couldn't remember which circle did what so they started verbally abusing anet for "making 2 different colored circles". This was after repeated explanations and 10+ pulls. Some folks are simply not capable and that frustration manifests in crying and anger.

@ArchonWing.9480 said:
If they didn't have raids, you'd have elitists in dungeons or fractals or whatnot. The good thing about raids is they're confined there now.

I seriously dont think theyre confined anywhere. Its really just the content that both needs large amount of repitition for some of the interesting rewards and require some rather mild coordination.

Since most people dont have that much time putting requirements is just one way to filter ppl so their success chance is higher and take less time. They dont want to bother explaining the whole thing everytime and rather just play.

This is partially correct.

There is however the other side that most people don't get. Training people is mentally taxing. Sure sometimes you get the people who research, care and geniunely want to improve. However those are far from the norm. From my time training people and not in one of the bigger Raid training groups is a lot of push back, crying and people adamant that they know better and outright refusing any help, critique or otherwise.

I had a unique experience where a group I was attempting to train on vg said that having green circles and blue circles was too confusing and they couldn't remember which circle did what so they started verbally abusing anet for "making 2 different colored circles". This was after repeated explanations and 10+ pulls. Some folks are simply not capable and that frustration manifests in crying and anger.

Then you simplify it
big circle=stand in it
small circle=dont stand in it.

@ArchonWing.9480 said:
If they didn't have raids, you'd have elitists in dungeons or fractals or whatnot. The good thing about raids is they're confined there now.

I seriously dont think theyre confined anywhere. Its really just the content that both needs large amount of repitition for some of the interesting rewards and require some rather mild coordination.

Since most people dont have that much time putting requirements is just one way to filter ppl so their success chance is higher and take less time. They dont want to bother explaining the whole thing everytime and rather just play.

This is partially correct.

There is however the other side that most people don't get. Training people is mentally taxing. Sure sometimes you get the people who research, care and geniunely want to improve. However those are far from the norm. From my time training people and not in one of the bigger Raid training groups is a lot of push back, crying and people adamant that they know better and outright refusing any help, critique or otherwise.

Training people successfully depends as much on the trainer as it does on the trainee. Some people are bad trainees, dont listen and don't follow instructions and are unwilling to change. And some trainers are bad trainers who just dictate and dont appreciate ANY feedback and dont listen to who they are training, or even worse dont actually know themselves.

@Blocki.4931 said:
You're very anti-raid, that you're seeing a rift there doesn't surprise me. Interest is dropping because content doesn't release at a fast enough pace for them to care. Then they come back once the new raid is out, do it for a couple months and stop playing it again. Does that surprise anybody? It shouldn't.

Not all of them are coming back, though, and the new raiders do not make up the difference.
See the gw2efficiency and completion rates - they are going down from raid to raid now. w6 has significantly lower completion rates than w5. Yes, they will probably go up a little with time, because this is a most recent raid, but still, w5 is the hardest raid so far, and w6 is much, much easier.
And yet even the very easy first boss of w6 has only a 7.5% completion rate (compared to dhuum's 6.5% and soulles horror's 9%).

Yes, the interest is dropping.

The whole point of a social game is to play with the people you want to play with, not be forced to play with the people you don't.

@Blocki.4931 said:
You're very anti-raid, that you're seeing a rift there doesn't surprise me. Interest is dropping because content doesn't release at a fast enough pace for them to care. Then they come back once the new raid is out, do it for a couple months and stop playing it again. Does that surprise anybody? It shouldn't.

Not all of them are coming back, though, and the new raiders do not make up the difference.
See the gw2efficiency and completion rates - they are going down from raid to raid now. w6 has significantly lower completion rates than w5. Yes, they will probably go up a little with time, because this is a most recent raid, but still, w5 is the hardest raid so far, and w6 is much, much easier.
And yet even the very easy first boss of w6 has only a 7.5% completion rate (compared to dhuum's 6.5% and soulles horror's 9%).

Yes, the interest is dropping.

the same thing can be also said for the living story episodes (they lose even more players in % and actuall numbers). so generally speaking its only natural in a life circle of a game to lose players anyway. sure on its peak a game will get more/same player numbers that leave, but that peak is long gone and only expansions are capable of bringing in more players then that have left over time. so while you present interesting numbers, i do not see how its a counterpoint to blocki´s comment.

@Astralporing.1957 said:
Not all of them are coming back, though, and the new raiders do not make up the difference.
See the gw2efficiency and completion rates - they are going down from raid to raid now. w6 has significantly lower completion rates than w5. Yes, they will probably go up a little with time, because this is a most recent raid, but still, w5 is the hardest raid so far, and w6 is much, much easier.
And yet even the very easy first boss of w6 has only a 7.5% completion rate (compared to dhuum's 6.5% and soulles horror's 9%).

Yes, the interest is dropping.

The interest is dropping in general though.
Compare these 7.5% with the living world achievements. They are even lower and also dropping.
Its pretty normal that people are not coming back and its no surprise that fewer people will complete content. Doesn't matter if raids, fractals or living story.

You're very anti-raid, that you're seeing a rift there doesn't surprise me. Interest is dropping because content doesn't release at a fast enough pace for them to care. Then they come back once the new raid is out, do it for a couple months and stop playing it again. Does that surprise anybody? It shouldn't.

You don't have to be anti-raid to see the rift. If you don't see it that means only one of the following:
1. You play another game and you only read the GW2 Forum - OR
2. You see it very well but you don't admit this. Why? I have no idea. Because the point 3 is too drastic to consider it real:
3. Someone cannot see the rift because his/hers social skills are very low (this can affect a player even in the RL) OR the logic of that person is so twisted that even if 1+1 = 2 then 2+2 IS NOT EQUAL 4.

The rift has been created even before the first raid wing reached the game. By the developers statement the the raids are only for .... This only creates a segregation. Segregation = separation. Separation = rift. And after this statement, the entire development team acted to put it into practice. Repeating that this is a good thing.
Can you see now the rift? Do you consider that the players were able to resist such a maneuver and to remain as a monolith despite of the intentional actions from ANet to separate the players in "the most dedicated / elite / ...etc" and "second hand players"?

That the efforts of ANet were channeled into a wrong direction is proved by the truth you states: "Interest is dropping because content doesn't release at a fast enough pace for them to care. Then they come back once the new raid is out, do it for a couple months and stop playing it again". Well, this is the attitude of the elite players.
If you remember, before HoT it was a looooong period with ZERO content released. With the same attitude from the "second hand" players the game should be dead by now. But they continued the play. Another difference in the approach - (another fact enlarging the rift? The attitude to the game?).

And to answer your question: "Does that surprise anybody?" - YES this is a surprise. Because ANet is wasting efforts only to cater for the few elites who only play for a limited period and leave the game until the next content release instead of focusing to keep the players who continues to play and to support the game despite some ... issues during the time. Another fact making the rift larger.

Thats why content needs to nerfed to be possible to complete by the lowest possible build in dps and support with same time as meta does. People will approve of this for challenge and difficulty is not apealing to majority of players. Make content possible for all to complete the way they want too

You're very anti-raid, that you're seeing a rift there doesn't surprise me. Interest is dropping because content doesn't release at a fast enough pace for them to care. Then they come back once the new raid is out, do it for a couple months and stop playing it again. Does that surprise anybody? It shouldn't.

You don't have to be anti-raid to see the rift. If you don't see it that means only one of the following:
1. You play another game and you only read the GW2 Forum - OR
2. You see it very well but you don't admit this. Why? I have no idea. Because the point 3 is too drastic to consider it real:
3. Someone cannot see the rift because his/hers social skills are very low (this can affect a player even in the RL) OR the logic of that person is so twisted that even if 1+1 = 2 then 2+2 IS NOT EQUAL 4.

Ah yes, so basically every one who disagrees with you is kitten and you are the only one correct. The best argument to make on every issue. You even split it up in 3 different but identical points.

Let me explain:

There is people who do not do any group content, they are the vast majority. None of those are even aware of raids or care about them.

The rift has been created even before the first raid wing reached the game. By the developers statement the the raids are only for .... This only creates a segregation. Segregation = separation. Separation = rift. And after this statement, the entire development team acted to put it into practice. Repeating that this is a good thing.
Can you see now the rift? Do you consider that the players were able to resist such a maneuver and to remain as a monolith despite of the intentional actions from ANet to separate the players in "the most dedicated / elite / ...etc" and "second hand players"?

No one is arguing against a segregation or rather separation between people who do raid and people who do not. It's the same for spvp and wvw, many do not engage in those game modes. To equalize rift (aka a dramatic problem) with simple separation takes a new level of genius though.

That the efforts of ANet were channeled into a wrong direction is proved by the truth you states: "Interest is dropping because content doesn't release at a fast enough pace for them to care. Then they come back once the new raid is out, do it for a couple months and stop playing it again". Well, this is the attitude of the elite players.
If you remember, before HoT it was a looooong period with ZERO content released. With the same attitude from the "second hand" players the game should be dead by now. But they continued the play. Another difference in the approach - (another fact enlarging the rift? The attitude to the game?).

The raid team is or was, before it got merged with the fractal team, approximately 5 people strong. Everyone was praising them for what a great job they did with the little resources devoted to the content by players and Arenanet. To argue misappropriation of resources you would first have to show that the results for the minor resources spent are severely lacking. Good luck with that.

And to answer your question: "Does that surprise anybody?" - YES this is a surprise. Because ANet is wasting efforts only to cater for the few elites who only play for a limited period and leave the game until the next content release instead of focusing to keep the players who continues to play and to support the game despite some ... issues during the time. Another fact making the rift larger.

Again, see previous statement. You are taking one of your own statements as fact (waste of resources) which clearly simply is not true. Then again, you have a very strong bias and have no issue letting that cloud your judgment.

Fun side fact: even the most devoted players (people who take the time to sign up on gw2efficiency) do not complete a majority of content from any game mode. If we really wanted to get into a xxx contest over which game mode deserves the most attention or lack of attention, raids and fractals with their small team sizes might not be the first on the block.

You're very anti-raid, that you're seeing a rift there doesn't surprise me. Interest is dropping because content doesn't release at a fast enough pace for them to care. Then they come back once the new raid is out, do it for a couple months and stop playing it again. Does that surprise anybody? It shouldn't.

You don't have to be anti-raid to see the rift. If you don't see it that means only one of the following:
1. You play another game and you only read the GW2 Forum - OR
2. You see it very well but you don't admit this. Why? I have no idea. Because the point 3 is too drastic to consider it real:
3. Someone cannot see the rift because his/hers social skills are very low (this can affect a player even in the RL) OR the logic of that person is so twisted that even if 1+1 = 2 then 2+2 IS NOT EQUAL 4.

4th option their is no rift and some people see one where their is none.

5th option they don't consider this rift a problem.

The rift has been created even before the first raid wing reached the game. By the developers statement the the raids are only for .... This only creates a segregation. Segregation = separation. Separation = rift. And after this statement, the entire development team acted to put it into practice. Repeating that this is a good thing.
Can you see now the rift? Do you consider that the players were able to resist such a maneuver and to remain as a monolith despite of the intentional actions from ANet to separate the players in "the most dedicated / elite / ...etc" and "second hand players"?

This rift you speak of exist also between different game modes, even different ls maps just in different variations and sizes.

That the efforts of ANet were channeled into a wrong direction is proved by the truth you states: "Interest is dropping because content doesn't release at a fast enough pace for them to care. Then they come back once the new raid is out, do it for a couple months and stop playing it again". Well, this is the attitude of the elite players.
If you remember, before HoT it was a looooong period with ZERO content released. With the same attitude from the "second hand" players the game should be dead by now. But they continued the play. Another difference in the approach - (another fact enlarging the rift? The attitude to the game?).

The general population is dropping not only the elite as you call them. This is a natural in the lifespan of a game.

And to answer your question: "Does that surprise anybody?" - YES this is a surprise. Because ANet is wasting efforts only to cater for the few elites who only play for a limited period and leave the game until the next content release instead of focusing to keep the players who continues to play and to support the game despite some ... issues during the time. Another fact making the rift larger.

Have you considered that not all raiders leave after a month. And that the retention percentage of people who raid might be higher then that of those who don't?

@Astralporing.1957 said:
See the gw2efficiency and completion rates - they are going down from raid to raid now. w6 has significantly lower completion rates than w5.

Notice how episode completion rates are also going down from episode to episode, same with episode participation rates. Daybreak was started by 54% (44% finished it) while A Star to Guide Us is down to 34% (26% completed it). You can't see raid completion rates in a vacuum and say that one wing has lower rates than the other, when the rest of the game's rates are also going down.

Edit:
To answer the "significantly lower" part:
Hall of Chains: First boss: 9.329% - Last Boss: 6.498% - Population that finished Daybreak: 44%
Mythwright Gambit: First boss: 6.972% - Last Boss: 3.992% - Population that finished A Star to Guide Us: 26%

14.7% of those that finished Daybreak killed Dhuum
15.3% of those that finished A Star to Guide Us killed Quadim

In the end, Wing 6 is doing better than Wing 5, it's still new and the rates will likely increase, and that's to be expected because it's also easier.

Play games for the challenge and the story is a bonus for me, gw 2 open world feel like 0 effort free rewards mostly as it requires minimum effort and squad leaders useally tell what to do which is simple stuff.

Raiding + dungeons in wildstar is one of the most amazing experiences i have ever tried and it was extremely well made and fun but going to gw 2 raiding and in general the many issues the game has it is not just about learning a fight but that veteran players have muscle memory about what to do in encounters, but new players have to learn a fight ontop of the crazy amount of visual clutter that is a huge plaque in this game, it is also a huge turnoff as you can barely see what is going on in fights.

I dont want em to make the raids directly easier but the game is in need of many QOL improvements, color options so we can change how telegraph work and their color, hide friendly telegraph / skills, it baffles me that people like over the top visual effects that actually prevent you seeing what is going on.

@wiazabi.2549 said:
I dont want em to make the raids directly easier but the game is in need of many QOL improvements, color options so we can change how telegraph work and their color, hide friendly telegraph / skills, it baffles me that people like over the top visual effects that actually prevent you seeing what is going on.

I don't think people like that at all! There are tons of threads that appear often asking for a reduction in the visual clutter, but still no response from the devs.

@Tyson.5160 said:
With this downward trend, are we going to eventually see certain pieces of content, stop being developed?

i don´t think so, at least not on the near future, financially it still seams to work. i guess it will rather be a full stop of developing anything at some point in time, with longer gaps between releases beforehand. (im not to optimistic with an exp3)
the goal is and will be to make the same money with less players. "creativity" in the gemshop is on a new high since pof.

@Astralporing.1957 said:
See the gw2efficiency and completion rates - they are going down from raid to raid now. w6 has significantly lower completion rates than w5.

Notice how episode completion rates are also going down from episode to episode, same with episode participation rates. Daybreak was started by 54% (44% finished it) while A Star to Guide Us is down to 34% (26% completed it). You can't see raid completion rates in a vacuum and say that one wing has lower rates than the other, when the rest of the game's rates are also going down.

Edit:
To answer the "significantly lower" part:
Hall of Chains: First boss: 9.329% - Last Boss: 6.498% - Population that finished Daybreak: 44%
Mythwright Gambit: First boss: 6.972% - Last Boss: 3.992% - Population that finished A Star to Guide Us: 26%

14.7% of those that finished Daybreak killed Dhuum
15.3% of those that finished A Star to Guide Us killed Quadim

In the end, Wing 6 is doing better than Wing 5, it's still new and the rates will likely increase, and that's to be expected because it's also easier.

We need to also take into account the fact W6 And W5 players have also no clue what the legendary ring looks like.

It is hard to make content really relevant when on an approximate release period of 10 months, the whole Gw2 player base has had triple the opportunity to get other rewards and yet no mean to acquire the legendary ring.

As for the low participation of A star To Guide Us, that may be due to the weaknesses of Kourna.

@ArchonWing.9480 said:
If they didn't have raids, you'd have elitists in dungeons or fractals or whatnot. The good thing about raids is they're confined there now.

I seriously dont think theyre confined anywhere. Its really just the content that both needs large amount of repitition for some of the interesting rewards and require some rather mild coordination.

Since most people dont have that much time putting requirements is just one way to filter ppl so their success chance is higher and take less time. They dont want to bother explaining the whole thing everytime and rather just play.

This is partially correct.

There is however the other side that most people don't get. Training people is mentally taxing. Sure sometimes you get the people who research, care and geniunely want to improve. However those are far from the norm. From my time training people and not in one of the bigger Raid training groups is a lot of push back, crying and people adamant that they know better and outright refusing any help, critique or otherwise.

I had a unique experience where a group I was attempting to train on vg said that having green circles and blue circles was too confusing and they couldn't remember which circle did what so they started verbally abusing anet for "making 2 different colored circles". This was after repeated explanations and 10+ pulls. Some folks are simply not capable and that frustration manifests in crying and anger.

Then you simplify it
big circle=stand in it
small circle=dont stand in it.

I wrote in my post that: The rift has been created even before the first raid wing reached the game. By the developers statement the the raids are only for .... This only creates a segregation. Segregation = separation. Separation = rift. And after this statement, the entire development team acted to put it into practice. Repeating that this is a good thing.
Can you see now the rift? Do you consider that the players were able to resist such a maneuver and to remain as a monolith despite of the intentional actions from ANet to separate the players in "the most dedicated / elite / ...etc" and "second hand players"?

Can you answer the question please: Do you consider that the players were able to resist such a maneuver and to remain as a monolith despite of the intentional actions from ANet to separate the players in "the most dedicated / elite / ...etc" and "second hand players"?

@Astralporing.1957 said:
See the gw2efficiency and completion rates - they are going down from raid to raid now. w6 has significantly lower completion rates than w5.

Notice how episode completion rates are also going down from episode to episode, same with episode participation rates. Daybreak was started by 54% (44% finished it) while A Star to Guide Us is down to 34% (26% completed it). You can't see raid completion rates in a vacuum and say that one wing has lower rates than the other, when the rest of the game's rates are also going down.

Edit:
To answer the "significantly lower" part:
Hall of Chains: First boss: 9.329% - Last Boss: 6.498% - Population that finished Daybreak: 44%
Mythwright Gambit: First boss: 6.972% - Last Boss: 3.992% - Population that finished A Star to Guide Us: 26%

14.7% of those that finished Daybreak killed Dhuum
15.3% of those that finished A Star to Guide Us killed Quadim

In the end, Wing 6 is doing better than Wing 5, it's still new and the rates will likely increase, and that's to be expected because it's also easier.

The person you answer (Astralporing.1957) brought into attention the completion rate of W5 and W6 and compared it. What relation can you raise between a raid wing and an episode from LS and how you can prove it is correct? What parameters you use?

This kind of comparation can be very deceptive. But let's go to the extreme and to use your method for the next (hypothetical) example:
Let's suppose the next LS episode will be completed by 10 players only. Also, let's suppose the 10 players also raids and they are able to complete the next raid wing (W7).
According to your analysis that means that 100% from the players completing the next LS episode completed the W7 raid wing.

Question: Can be this a moment of joy for ANet? (100% players are raiding). Or the other number should trigger a reaction - only 10 players completed the LS episode? What do you think?

@robertthebard.8150 said:
Then there are the "show me you have the achievement for this raid before we'll let you in the group. Gee, if I had the achievement, I wouldn't need to be in your group. My healer spec'd sage in swtor was denied entrance into one such raid, for that very reason. My guildies and I were chatting about it, and I decided to see just how hard it would be to solo it, and I did solo it, with one of her NPC crewmates, anyway.

I played SW:ToR from release up until GW2 released (and the ship was already sinking) and later tried out KOTFE and KOTET and I call BS. World Bosses actively shut down companions and you had to be massively overleveled to solo them as well (i.E. Belsavis and Hoth World Bosses were impossible for a singular lvl 50 to take down).

As for Raids (Operations): Eternity Vault, Karagga's Palace, The Denova Conflict, Dread Masters, etc. could not be "solo'd" on level and even before level synchronisation was a thing I seriously doubt a lvl 60 player having an easy enough time in any of the Raid instances. That was either an incredible easy Flashpoint (with the solo mode activated i.E. Raid on Tython/Korriban) or nonsense for the sake of showing off.

@Cristalyan.5728 said:
The person you answer (Astralporing.1957) brought into attention the completion rate of W5 and W6 and compared it. What relation can you raise between a raid wing and an episode from LS and how you can prove it is correct? What parameters you use?

The completion rate between W5 and W6 is a meaningless number because the available population for the two Wings is vastly different. The episode completion rates show how many players played the relevant episodes (when the wings were released) so it's a very good indicator of active players.

This kind of comparation can be very deceptive.

The comparison that is deceptive is the one used by Astralporing.1957 because it doesn't take into account how many players are still playing the game, a number easily acquired by the episode completion statistics. My comparison has nothing deceptive about it, only accurate statistics.

Let's suppose the next LS episode will be completed by 10 players only. Also, let's suppose the 10 players also raids and they are able to complete the next raid wing (W7).
According to your analysis that means that 100% from the players completing the next LS episode completed the W7 raid wing.

This isn't going to happen. I can give you a reverse example. In fact, my example is rooted to reality unlike yours:
10000 players play the game, 1000 of them are raiding, that's 10% of the population that is raiding.
After a couple of episodes the next Raid wing is released but only 1000 players are still playing the episode. Do you expect the number of Raiders to stay at 1000 (100%)? No, that's highly unlikely. The more likely outcome is to be something around 100, to stay at the 10% number established from the previous set of data.
According to Astralporing.1957 logic, the second Raid Wing in the example above is a massive failure because 1/10th of the players played it. However, if you take into account that only 1/10th of the players are left playing the game as a whole, the percentage of raiders is still 10%, which is rather good.

Question: Can be this a moment of joy for ANet? (100% players are raiding). Or the other number should trigger a reaction - only 10 players completed the LS episode?

I already gave the appropriate data:
14.7% of those that finished Daybreak killed Dhuum
15.3% of those that finished A Star to Guide Us killed Quadim
This means that Wing 6 is a success compared to Wing 5

A few more examples absolute numbers are worthless (and deceptive):
Vale Guardian (30.698%) has a higher completion rate than the most recent episode (26%) so if we use only absolute numbers and not take into account how many players are still playing the game, Arenanet should stop releasing episodes and instead focus on giving us more Vale Guardian-style Raids because they are more popular than the episodes. And probably much cheaper/faster to make if the entire company works on them. Of course we all know (or should) that although the data show that, in reality it's false.

Imagine you have 100 balls, 50 are blue and 50 are red. The percentage of Blue balls is 50%. Now remove 50 balls so you are left with 50, let's suppose that the removal was fair, so we are left with 25 blue and 25 red balls. According to your logic, the new balls we have is 25% blue because they compare the percentage of blue balls with the entire registered balls, and not with how many are still available. Of course, logic (and statistics) beg to differ, and we still have 50% blue balls. Only our population of balls is half.

I wrote in my post that: The rift has been created even before the first raid wing reached the game. By the developers statement the the raids are only for .... This only creates a segregation. Segregation = separation. Separation = rift. And after this statement, the entire development team acted to put it into practice. Repeating that this is a good thing.
Can you see now the rift? Do you consider that the players were able to resist such a maneuver and to remain as a monolith despite of the intentional actions from ANet to separate the players in "the most dedicated / elite / ...etc" and "second hand players"?

Can you answer the question please: Do you consider that the players were able to resist such a maneuver and to remain as a monolith despite of the intentional actions from ANet to separate the players in "the most dedicated / elite / ...etc" and "second hand players"?

The funny thing is the only people I have ever seen use the word second hand/ rate player is from the group of people wanting raids gone.

To answer you're question, I don't believe in the existence of this monolith. Some people left some people joined and some left. It was never a they against us situation
(well except in fora debates maybe, )

@Astralporing.1957 said:
See the gw2efficiency and completion rates - they are going down from raid to raid now. w6 has significantly lower completion rates than w5.

Notice how episode completion rates are also going down from episode to episode, same with episode participation rates. Daybreak was started by 54% (44% finished it) while A Star to Guide Us is down to 34% (26% completed it). You can't see raid completion rates in a vacuum and say that one wing has lower rates than the other, when the rest of the game's rates are also going down.

Edit:
To answer the "significantly lower" part:
Hall of Chains: First boss: 9.329% - Last Boss: 6.498% - Population that finished Daybreak: 44%
Mythwright Gambit: First boss: 6.972% - Last Boss: 3.992% - Population that finished A Star to Guide Us: 26%

14.7% of those that finished Daybreak killed Dhuum
15.3% of those that finished A Star to Guide Us killed Quadim

In the end, Wing 6 is doing better than Wing 5, it's still new and the rates will likely increase, and that's to be expected because it's also easier.

The person you answer (Astralporing.1957) brought into attention the completion rate of W5 and W6 and compared it. What relation can you raise between a raid wing and an episode from LS and how you can prove it is correct? What parameters you use?

This kind of comparation can be very deceptive. But let's go to the extreme and to use your method for the next (hypothetical) example:
Let's suppose the next LS episode will be completed by 10 players only. Also, let's suppose the 10 players also raids and they are able to complete the next raid wing (W7).
According to your analysis that means that 100% from the players completing the next LS episode completed the W7 raid wing.

Question: Can be this a moment of joy for ANet? (100% players are raiding). Or the other number should trigger a reaction - only 10 players completed the LS episode? What do you think?

While I understand you're general argument we have no idea what the net Winn loss was.

The only thing maddoctor claimed is only looking at completion rates is nonsensical. As you have to compare them to the total population.

I already gave the appropriate data:
14.7% of those that finished Daybreak killed Dhuum
15.3% of those that finished A Star to Guide Us killed Quadim
This means that Wing 6 is a success compared to Wing 5

A few more examples absolute numbers are worthless (and deceptive):
Vale Guardian (30.698%) has a higher completion rate than the most recent episode (26%) so if we use only absolute numbers and not take into account how many players are still playing the game, Arenanet should stop releasing episodes and instead focus on giving us more Vale Guardian-style Raids because they are more popular than the episodes. And probably much cheaper/faster to make if the entire company works on them. Of course we all know (or should) that although the data show that, in reality it's false.

Imagine you have 100 balls, 50 are blue and 50 are red. The percentage of Blue balls is 50%. Now remove 50 balls so you are left with 50, let's suppose that the removal was fair, so we are left with 25 blue and 25 red balls. According to your logic, the new balls we have is 25% blue because they compare the percentage of blue balls with the entire registered balls, and not with how many are still available. Of course, logic (and statistics) beg to differ, and we still have 50% blue balls. Only our population of balls is half.

In your opinion the numbers are deceptive, while the statistics are THE TRUE? This remembers me one of the Murphy's laws regarding the scientist world:" Don't let yourself deceived by the palpable results of the experiments. The theory is always right".

All your examples gives me right. I mean not the percentage is the reason of action, but the absolute numbers. The only situation when what Astralporing.1957 said is false (or not in accordance to the reality) is when the number of players playing the W6 is greater than the number of players playing W5. Only in that situation the almost the same percentage of success in W6 could mean that a greater number of players completed it. But, even you agree that the number of W6 players is smaller than the W5 players. Your example with the balls shows this (Only our population of balls is half.). So, an almost the same percentage (15,3 vs 14,7) from a much smaller number (25% vs 44%) means that the interest in W6 raised in comparation with W5? In the condition you agree in your post that the population decreased?

@qwerty.8943 said:
So what is a 'semi-casual', "competent-but-not-uber DPS", though "wants-to-learn" supposed to do?

Don't worry. The next Guild Wars will come out on mobile, and have such a bad/limited interface that everybody can be an elite raider by the end of a week! But for now... why don't you join the raid-training discord, and group up with other people in the same boat?

Where can I find this raid-training Discord? I've been wanting to try them out now that my Weaver is geared.

Also please before you wonder or complain about not being able to train do a simple google search (talking generally here not for someone in particular). This is literally the first thing you see in google when you enter "guild wars 2 raid training" : https://imgur.com/a/pL6QvJx

Everything is there. How do you think people will see your commitment to learn when you cannot even bother to do a simple google search?

Also concerning the OP the link above answers your question about what you are supposed to do. What you should do is find 10 ppl with which you can actually raid with. It is not a raid issue. Its a guild/socializing issue. Use the resources above and just find like-minded ppl to play with. Thats it.

I am so supersized how spoiled GW2 players are from the seamless open world grouping that think that basic everyday difficulties of human beings socializing and doing challenging things together as some kind of unique game issue that the devs need to fix. There is so much that the game can do. The rest is on you. When you are unsatisfied by your friends you do not go to the police and ask them to do sth or to an open square shouting "my friends are awful and i am not happy". You just change your social circle to sth that works better. Its the same with actual group content that requires you to actually talk to others to finish.

I already gave the appropriate data:
14.7% of those that finished Daybreak killed Dhuum
15.3% of those that finished A Star to Guide Us killed Quadim
This means that Wing 6 is a success compared to Wing 5

A few more examples absolute numbers are worthless (and deceptive):
Vale Guardian (30.698%) has a higher completion rate than the most recent episode (26%) so if we use only absolute numbers and not take into account how many players are still playing the game, Arenanet should stop releasing episodes and instead focus on giving us more Vale Guardian-style Raids because they are more popular than the episodes. And probably much cheaper/faster to make if the entire company works on them. Of course we all know (or should) that although the data show that, in reality it's false.

Imagine you have 100 balls, 50 are blue and 50 are red. The percentage of Blue balls is 50%. Now remove 50 balls so you are left with 50, let's suppose that the removal was fair, so we are left with 25 blue and 25 red balls. According to your logic, the new balls we have is 25% blue because they compare the percentage of blue balls with the entire registered balls, and not with how many are still available. Of course, logic (and statistics) beg to differ, and we still have 50% blue balls. Only our population of balls is half.

In your opinion the numbers are deceptive, while the statistics are THE TRUE? This remembers me one of the Murphy's laws regarding the scientist world:" Don't let yourself deceived by the palpable results of the experiments. The theory is always right".

All your examples gives me right. I mean not the percentage is the reason of action, but the absolute numbers. The only situation when what Astralporing.1957 said is false (or not in accordance to the reality) is when the number of players playing the W6 is greater than the number of players playing W5. Only in that situation the almost the same percentage of success in W6 could mean that a greater number of players completed it. But, even you agree that the number of W6 players is smaller than the W5 players. Your example with the balls shows this (Only our population of balls is half.). So, an almost the same percentage (15,3 vs 14,7) from a much smaller number (25% vs 44%) means that the interest in W6 raised in comparation with W5? In the condition you agree in your post that the population decreased?

It seems to my as a diminished interest.

So you think we should stop developing ls? Pvp? Etc because the interest is diminishing for these modes also.

@Cristalyan.5728 said:
In your opinion the numbers are deceptive, while the statistics are THE TRUE? This remembers me one of the Murphy's laws regarding the scientist world:" Don't let yourself deceived by the palpable results of the experiments. The theory is always right".

In my opinion statistics used correctly are true while statistics used incorrectly are false.

All your examples gives me right. I mean not the percentage is the reason of action, but the absolute numbers. The only situation when what Astralporing.1957 said is false (or not in accordance to the reality) is when the number of players playing the W6 is greater than the number of players playing W5.

No, absolute numbers mean nothing, that's why I gave all those examples which you either didn't read or failed to understand. His comparison isn't in accordance to reality because the number of current players is different (lower) than the number of players available during Daybreak. Therefore, saying that the interest IN RAIDS is dropping is deceptive because the interest in the whole game is also dropping.

Since you like absolute numbers so much, I will suggest you read about Vale Guardian (30%) having higher absolute numbers than the most recent episode (26%). See what kind of false conclusions you can come up with if you use absolute numbers?

It seems to my as a diminished interest.

To the ENTIRE GAME, not RAIDS alone, that was the whole point that Astral was missing or conveniently ignored to pass his point of "raid interest is dwindling!". In fact the percentage of the given population that is raiding is higher than before, not lower. It's the interest in the game that is dwindling, not the interest in Raids.
Since you love absolute numbers so much W6 is at 6.498% and W5 is at 3.992%, that's an absolute number reduction of a mere 2.5% that Astral said "w6 has significantly lower completion rates than w5", meanwhile Daybreak has a completion rate of 44% while A Star to Guide Us is at 26%, that's a 18% reduction.

if 2.5% is "significantly lower" and reason for Anet to worry, then what is 18%? Reason to say that the game is dead?

I already gave the appropriate data:
14.7% of those that finished Daybreak killed Dhuum
15.3% of those that finished A Star to Guide Us killed Quadim
This means that Wing 6 is a success compared to Wing 5

A few more examples absolute numbers are worthless (and deceptive):
Vale Guardian (30.698%) has a higher completion rate than the most recent episode (26%) so if we use only absolute numbers and not take into account how many players are still playing the game, Arenanet should stop releasing episodes and instead focus on giving us more Vale Guardian-style Raids because they are more popular than the episodes. And probably much cheaper/faster to make if the entire company works on them. Of course we all know (or should) that although the data show that, in reality it's false.

Imagine you have 100 balls, 50 are blue and 50 are red. The percentage of Blue balls is 50%. Now remove 50 balls so you are left with 50, let's suppose that the removal was fair, so we are left with 25 blue and 25 red balls. According to your logic, the new balls we have is 25% blue because they compare the percentage of blue balls with the entire registered balls, and not with how many are still available. Of course, logic (and statistics) beg to differ, and we still have 50% blue balls. Only our population of balls is half.

In your opinion the numbers are deceptive, while the statistics are THE TRUE? This remembers me one of the Murphy's laws regarding the scientist world:" Don't let yourself deceived by the palpable results of the experiments. The theory is always right".

All your examples gives me right. I mean not the percentage is the reason of action, but the absolute numbers. The only situation when what Astralporing.1957 said is false (or not in accordance to the reality) is when the number of players playing the W6 is greater than the number of players playing W5. Only in that situation the almost the same percentage of success in W6 could mean that a greater number of players completed it. But, even you agree that the number of W6 players is smaller than the W5 players. Your example with the balls shows this (Only our population of balls is half.). So, an almost the same percentage (15,3 vs 14,7) from a much smaller number (25% vs 44%) means that the interest in W6 raised in comparation with W5? In the condition you agree in your post that the population decreased?

It seems to my as a diminished interest.

The overall population in all game modes has decreased. The proportion of the active population (if we take story completion to be representative of the entire population) interested in raids has not. If you are measuring interest by using absolute numbers then you also need to conceed that interest in living world content has also diminished and by your interpretation has decreased at a greater scale than raids. Honestly that interpretation is nonsensical and we should only talk about active population.

@Laila Lightness.8742 said:
Not everyone uses gw2efficienty there those numbers comes from. And those numbers are time specific like latest month

True, which I accounted for by stating that more dedicated players use gw2 efficiency and many suggestions made here are contrary to what those numbers show.

If we were to assume less hardcore players or casual players are more likely to not use gw2eff and are less likely to raid or do challenging group content, the entire premise suggested here that there is a rift becomes even less possible or viable.

The same applies to forums.

If you were to ask me, I'd wager a vast majority of players are simply playing the game at their own leisure not worrying about raids or T4 fractals. Basically enjoying open world content and the easy going nature of the game. Most of those players don't give a flying f about raids. They are as such not part of any rift.

@robertthebard.8150 said:
Then there are the "show me you have the achievement for this raid before we'll let you in the group. Gee, if I had the achievement, I wouldn't need to be in your group. My healer spec'd sage in swtor was denied entrance into one such raid, for that very reason. My guildies and I were chatting about it, and I decided to see just how hard it would be to solo it, and I did solo it, with one of her NPC crewmates, anyway.

I played SW:ToR from release up until GW2 released (and the ship was already sinking) and later tried out KOTFE and KOTET and I call BS. World Bosses actively shut down companions and you had to be massively overleveled to solo them as well (i.E. Belsavis and Hoth World Bosses were impossible for a singular lvl 50 to take down).

As for Raids (Operations): Eternity Vault, Karagga's Palace, The Denova Conflict, Dread Masters, etc. could not be "solo'd" on level and even before level synchronisation was a thing I seriously doubt a lvl 60 player having an easy enough time in any of the Raid instances. That was either an incredible easy Flashpoint (with the solo mode activated i.E. Raid on Tython/Korriban) or nonsense for the sake of showing off.

@robertthebard.8150 said:
Then there are the "show me you have the achievement for this raid before we'll let you in the group. Gee, if I had the achievement, I wouldn't need to be in your group. My healer spec'd sage in swtor was denied entrance into one such raid, for that very reason. My guildies and I were chatting about it, and I decided to see just how hard it would be to solo it, and I did solo it, with one of her NPC crewmates, anyway.

I played SW:ToR from release up until GW2 released (and the ship was already sinking) and later tried out KOTFE and KOTET and I call BS. World Bosses actively shut down companions and you had to be massively overleveled to solo them as well (i.E. Belsavis and Hoth World Bosses were impossible for a singular lvl 50 to take down).

As for Raids (Operations): Eternity Vault, Karagga's Palace, The Denova Conflict, Dread Masters, etc. could not be "solo'd" on level and even before level synchronisation was a thing I seriously doubt a lvl 60 player having an easy enough time in any of the Raid instances. That was either an incredible easy Flashpoint (with the solo mode activated i.E. Raid on Tython/Korriban) or nonsense for the sake of showing off.

@robertthebard.8150 said:
Then there are the "show me you have the achievement for this raid before we'll let you in the group. Gee, if I had the achievement, I wouldn't need to be in your group. My healer spec'd sage in swtor was denied entrance into one such raid, for that very reason. My guildies and I were chatting about it, and I decided to see just how hard it would be to solo it, and I did solo it, with one of her NPC crewmates, anyway.

I played SW:ToR from release up until GW2 released (and the ship was already sinking) and later tried out KOTFE and KOTET and I call BS. World Bosses actively shut down companions and you had to be massively overleveled to solo them as well (i.E. Belsavis and Hoth World Bosses were impossible for a singular lvl 50 to take down).

As for Raids (Operations): Eternity Vault, Karagga's Palace, The Denova Conflict, Dread Masters, etc. could not be "solo'd" on level and even before level synchronisation was a thing I seriously doubt a lvl 60 player having an easy enough time in any of the Raid instances. That was either an incredible easy Flashpoint (with the solo mode activated i.E. Raid on Tython/Korriban) or nonsense for the sake of showing off.

I didn't say World Boss. However, before they level sync'd everyone to every zone, soloing a World Boss, except for the 40+ zones wasn't really much of an achievement, unless you did the one on Coruscant, that hit my level 50 sage, when that was the cap, for 40K HP in one shot.

Yes, I did misspeak. I ran The Battle of Ilum, at 50, when it was the cap, before level sync and Story Mode. I also had the pleasure of soloing the last 70ish% of the boss in The False Emperor on my Jugg tank, because he one shotted the rest of my party, and rather than respawn, they figured they'd wait for me to die, and just respawn all at once. They went from waiting for me to die to cheerleaders, as I wore him down. Tython and Korriban FPs weren't even in the game yet.

That's the thing, you see, I can be wrong, or mistaken, and own it. I didn't, however, lie. I used raid because unless you've played swtor, you wouldn't know what a FP was, and since they're just 4 man raids, it's easier to explain. However, this just goes to further my point: Did I really need to prove I'd been in the Battle of Illum to run the FP, on a healer?

When I was in high school running track there was a small, but vocal, element of the track team that was angry that they never made it onto our top seed 4x100m team. This same group of people never put the effort in during speed training days, slacked off or left early on weight training days, and chose to do field event training instead of hand-off training when the choice was given. They accused the coaches of favoritism and said that having the same group of kids as our top seeded team was elitist. The coaches even offered, in less competitive meets, to split up our top team and create 4 teams composed of 1 veteran and 3 up-and-comers (which was rejected, because the individuals voicing complaints wanted to be on the full top-seeded team). I honestly never empathized with the complaints against our top team composition. Our top guys practiced long after everyone had gone home, took every interval on every speed day super seriously, bonded like a family, and had a proven record of success (traveling to international competitions and placing quite well, which isn't super common in the US).

Despite a few vocal angry individuals, there was no rift on our track team. In fact, each year it grew further and further and even wound up producing a number of Olympians, All-American athletes, NCAA D1 All-East athletes, and scholarship winners.

@Astralporing.1957 said:
See the gw2efficiency and completion rates - they are going down from raid to raid now. w6 has significantly lower completion rates than w5.

Notice how episode completion rates are also going down from episode to episode, same with episode participation rates. Daybreak was started by 54% (44% finished it) while A Star to Guide Us is down to 34% (26% completed it). You can't see raid completion rates in a vacuum and say that one wing has lower rates than the other, when the rest of the game's rates are also going down.

Edit:
To answer the "significantly lower" part:
Hall of Chains: First boss: 9.329% - Last Boss: 6.498% - Population that finished Daybreak: 44%
Mythwright Gambit: First boss: 6.972% - Last Boss: 3.992% - Population that finished A Star to Guide Us: 26%

Well, if the LS completion rates are a representative of the overall population, and not just the hardcore crowd, then you're right. We have a much bigger problem than raids dying out: a game dying out
(because a loss of a third of the playerbase in so short of a time is a really, really worrying sign).

@maddoctor.2738 said:
This isn't going to happen. I can give you a reverse example. In fact, my example is rooted to reality unlike yours:
10000 players play the game, 1000 of them are raiding, that's 10% of the population that is raiding.
After a couple of episodes the next Raid wing is released but only 1000 players are still playing the episode. Do you expect the number of Raiders to stay at 1000 (100%)? No, that's highly unlikely. The more likely outcome is to be something around 100, to stay at the 10% number established from the previous set of data.
According to Astralporing.1957 logic, the second Raid Wing in the example above is a massive failure because 1/10th of the players played it. However, if you take into account that only 1/10th of the players are left playing the game as a whole, the percentage of raiders is still 10%, which is rather good.

Actually, no. That would still make the raid a massive failure. It would just also make the rest of the game a massive failure as well.

The whole point of a social game is to play with the people you want to play with, not be forced to play with the people you don't.

You're very anti-raid, that you're seeing a rift there doesn't surprise me. Interest is dropping because content doesn't release at a fast enough pace for them to care. Then they come back once the new raid is out, do it for a couple months and stop playing it again. Does that surprise anybody? It shouldn't.

You don't have to be anti-raid to see the rift. If you don't see it that means only one of the following:
1. You play another game and you only read the GW2 Forum - OR
2. You see it very well but you don't admit this. Why? I have no idea. Because the point 3 is too drastic to consider it real:
3. Someone cannot see the rift because his/hers social skills are very low (this can affect a player even in the RL) OR the logic of that person is so twisted that even if 1+1 = 2 then 2+2 IS NOT EQUAL 4.

Ah yes, so basically every one who disagrees with you is kitten and you are the only one correct. The best argument to make on every issue. You even split it up in 3 different but identical points.

Let me explain:

There is people who do not do any group content, they are the vast majority. None of those are even aware of raids or care about them.

The rift has been created even before the first raid wing reached the game. By the developers statement the the raids are only for .... This only creates a segregation. Segregation = separation. Separation = rift. And after this statement, the entire development team acted to put it into practice. Repeating that this is a good thing.
Can you see now the rift? Do you consider that the players were able to resist such a maneuver and to remain as a monolith despite of the intentional actions from ANet to separate the players in "the most dedicated / elite / ...etc" and "second hand players"?

No one is arguing against a segregation or rather separation between people who do raid and people who do not. It's the same for spvp and wvw, many do not engage in those game modes. To equalize rift (aka a dramatic problem) with simple separation takes a new level of genius though.

That the efforts of ANet were channeled into a wrong direction is proved by the truth you states: "Interest is dropping because content doesn't release at a fast enough pace for them to care. Then they come back once the new raid is out, do it for a couple months and stop playing it again". Well, this is the attitude of the elite players.
If you remember, before HoT it was a looooong period with ZERO content released. With the same attitude from the "second hand" players the game should be dead by now. But they continued the play. Another difference in the approach - (another fact enlarging the rift? The attitude to the game?).

The raid team is or was, before it got merged with the fractal team, approximately 5 people strong. Everyone was praising them for what a great job they did with the little resources devoted to the content by players and Arenanet. To argue misappropriation of resources you would first have to show that the results for the minor resources spent are severely lacking. Good luck with that.

And to answer your question: "Does that surprise anybody?" - YES this is a surprise. Because ANet is wasting efforts only to cater for the few elites who only play for a limited period and leave the game until the next content release instead of focusing to keep the players who continues to play and to support the game despite some ... issues during the time. Another fact making the rift larger.

Again, see previous statement. You are taking one of your own statements as fact (waste of resources) which clearly simply is not true. Then again, you have a very strong bias and have no issue letting that cloud your judgment.

Fun side fact: even the most devoted players (people who take the time to sign up on gw2efficiency) do not complete a majority of content from any game mode. If we really wanted to get into a xxx contest over which game mode deserves the most attention or lack of attention, raids and fractals with their small team sizes might not be the first on the block.

Couldn't have said it better myself. Thanks for saving me a couple minutes.

Smugly chuckling forever.
My sentence doesn't make sense? Well, I probably forgot to write half of it before posting.

@Astralporing.1957 said:
Well, if the LS completion rates are a representative of the overall population, then you're right. We have a much bigger problem than raids dying out: a game dying out
(because a loss of a third of the playerbase in so short of a time is a really, really worrying sign).

They probably don't account for PVP and WVW exclusive players, but everyone else should be there, or do you expect Raiders to not care about the Episodes? Not even enough to finish them?

Actually, no. That would still make the raid a massive failure. It would just also make the rest of the game a massive failure as well.

You are right, my 1/10th example wasn't very good, of course if a game loses 1/10th of its population it will be a massive failure overall. But I think lower reductions are normal for any game. The participation rates for the later episodes of Season 3 were very low, lower than Path of Fire, so maybe the same thing will happen with Season 4 and episode rates will fall bellow the next expansion's rates.

@Astralporing.1957 said:
Well, if the LS completion rates are a representative of the overall population, then you're right. We have a much bigger problem than raids dying out: a game dying out
(because a loss of a third of the playerbase in so short of a time is a really, really worrying sign).

They probably don't account for PVP and WVW exclusive players, but everyone else should be there, or do you expect Raiders to not care about the Episodes? Not even enough to finish them?

No, i just don't expect the huge majority of casual players to even use the site. And that shifts the results towards statistics covering just the more hardcore part of the community (meaning, i expect that a way bigger percentage of raiders use that site that in the case of people playing LS). Whether the LS percentage drop numbers are representative of the rest of the community as well, i don't know. If they are, then it is a major reason to worry.

The whole point of a social game is to play with the people you want to play with, not be forced to play with the people you don't.

Here's a thought to add to the completions: What if it's just that people don't care? What if it's not just that they're leaving, but that they're doing other things? I'm not geared out enough for end game type content, such as the fractals, and I only have Season 4 of LS, which I haven't even started yet. Is it likely that people are moving on? Yeah, it is. The game's been out a long while now, and people tend to do that. Even hardcore raiders will float between MMOs, coming for a new release until they master it, and then moving on to another game. That's been happening for years now, but it doesn't necessarily mean "dead" or "doomed" game, it just means that people aren't playing tracked aspects of it.

@Astralporing.1957 said:
Well, if the LS completion rates are a representative of the overall population, then you're right. We have a much bigger problem than raids dying out: a game dying out
(because a loss of a third of the playerbase in so short of a time is a really, really worrying sign).

They probably don't account for PVP and WVW exclusive players, but everyone else should be there, or do you expect Raiders to not care about the Episodes? Not even enough to finish them?

No, i just don't expect the huge majority of casual players to even use the site. And that shifts the results towards statistics covering just the more hardcore part of the community. Whether that is representative of the rest of the game, as far as LS goes, i don't know. If it is, then it is a major reason to worry.

Obviously GW2 doesn't have only 200k accounts, the vast majority doesn't know gw2eff even exist. By everyone else I didn't mean every player, more like the PVE players. And I believe PVE players do most of PVE and a "I'm just running Raids" kind of player is super rare (I haven't seen any at least)

Just to be fair with the game, these are the statistics since Heart of Thorns:Heart of Thorns: 66.937%
Out of the Shadows: 60.676%
Rising Flames: 58.131%
A Crack in the Ice: 56.343%
The Head of the Snake: 51.405%
Flashpoint: 50.272%
One Path Ends: 47.145%Path of Fire: 59.476%
Daybreak: 44.121%
A Bug in the System: 38.387%
Long Live the Lich: 34.108%
A Star to Guide Us: 26.049%

As you can see Path of Fire has a much higher completion rate than all but one Living World episode (and that by a 2% difference). Given how Anet is doing better financially (according to revenue reports), we can say that many gw2eff players stopped playing (so rates are lower) and not enough new players make accounts on that site anymore, although the game does get lots of new accounts as we can see on the forums (many new people posting). The other "solution" is that although the population is getting lower and lower, they spend more and more, resulting in a revenue increase. Now which one is it? Who knows.